This is Pretty Sad - Kite Runner Banned in Afghanistan
Ministry of information and culture has banned the import and exhibition of The Kite Runner on the fear of social consequences. The film is based on the novel by Khalid Husseini about the troubled friendship of two Afghan boys. The kite runner offers an image of Afghanistan before the wars and has a personal touch of the friendship between Amir, the son of a wealthy Pashtun, and Hassan, the Hazara son of Amir’s father’s servant. although, the kite runner is not much different than most other stories about Afghanistan. It’s about hardship and difficulties, it builds on the foundation that any afghan story could only be told by pain and disaster. But kite runner is different than most other popular stories about Afghanistan, it has a personal touch and it tells the story of fun and joy.
Apparently, ministry is concerned about a couple of controversial scenes in the film: first, Hassan is raped in an alley by a bunch of Pashtun bullies. Second, Hassan’s son, Sohrab, is later forced to perform an erotic dance by a Talib. Let’s break this down and try to analyse, I have heard from friends who remember the seventies that a rape case surfaced into the local papers around the same time that the story of the film is taking place. The rape became popular among Kabulis in late 1970s, after the government failed to respond. The raped boy decided to ravage and killed all the three attackers. Apparently the story had no ethnic profile. If the story is proven true then Khalid, the author, has not taken into consideration the events which were taking place around the same time as his story, or he has deliberately distorted the truth to make his story more exciting. I think both are fine. He never claims it’s the truth. It’s a fiction and artistic imagination of a writer. I am wondering, why is it so hard for minister of information and culture to understand that imagination and fiction is the basis of artistic recreation.